And it was Monday again...

It was a wonderful family-packed weekend from Friday through Sunday. A pizza lunch, valentine-making with Danielle, bowling, a pajama party, Sunday School, church, frosted tree viewing, Sunday ravioli supper here, and "Wii". Then Monday morning - out with the paints!

Then, cutting my squares for the quilt I'll start sewing on Wednesday!

And off to Monday afternoon's Calligraphy class!

Gray days

Yesterday was a gray but pretty day. Everything was gray. The sky was gray. The trees were frosty gray. It looked like something out of a fairytale. Today it's just gray. Everything is still. No movement. I finally saw some birds sitting on the telephone wires. I enjoy seeing an entire line of them sitting there and always wonder why? Here's what I read:

"It fits their claws easily, and they are high enough to see things- with no branches for predators to climb up. Hawk populations increase where there are telephone poles to perch on."

Lettering practice

Yesterday afternoon, while I practiced my Bookhand...

... Danielle practiced her lowercase alphabet. Hard for little hands, I think doing this together worked well. She worked longer than usual with me struggling at her side.

They found it!

The juncos came. Here they are, hopping around, looking for seed.

The snow melted and they found it.

Beautiful little birds; their greys and whites blend like a little watercolor painting.

Mayslake

Yesterday, Marge and I took a ride out to Mayslake Peabody Estate to see the Midwest Collage Society's "Memory" exhibit.

A dreary winter day, but the Tudor-Revival style buildings are lovely at any time of the year.

The exhibit is outstanding. Each piece, interesting and inspiring.

The grandeur of the rooms gives an air of elegance to the exhibit.

Inspiration follows you as you look out every window, from the beautiful buildings to ...

the lovely landscape...

to the beautiful architecture inside.

The buildings seem to beg you to stay... and paint.

The Portiuncula Chapel, a replica of the Portiuncula Chapel in Assisi, Italy.

It was such a nice venture. See you soon, Mayslake! We'll be back.

Remember them?

Just a start, but I brought watercolor paper to pen&ink class today instead of drawing paper, so I decided to paint! Had the photographs of last Spring's doves that nested here, so went with it. Have to get some darks in there, so we'll see what happens.

Yesterday's class

A perfect class of 9 perfectly wonderful gals! With soft music playing, they did a magazine collage of what was on their minds today. Their thoughts on paper. Peggy fills her paper with a nice composition.

Teri S and Judy work with decisions.

Teri S, puts in a lot of thought and Sandy lays down some good ideas. Chocolat!

Here Teri M looks for just the right placement.

Denise's is in the foreground, finding pictures that pleased her.

The class pulled out images, words, and text from magazines of things that describe their thoughts right now. From that collage, they are to choose one section to concentrate on, photocopy and expand on to begin their work on a finished piece next week.